ADVANCED INTEGRATIVE THERAPYis a set of protocols, processes, and other methods, with a psychodynamic, cognitive-behavioral, and transpersonal theoretical foundation that provides thorough, deep, quick, and relatively painless treatment even for people with personality disorders, dissociative disorders, and multiple diagnoses.

It does this by positing that traumata are the origins of negative beliefs, desires, compulsions, obsessions, fantasies, addictions, and other symptoms, and by treating traumata, symptoms, and the connections among them energetically. This form of treatment also makes possible the resolution of psychogenic illnesses.

Finally, by including treatment protocols that focus on spiritual blockage, along with methods for instilling positive qualities, centering, embodiment, grounding, and presence, it provides opportunities for spiritual development for interested clients and therapists alike.

HOW AIT ACTUALLY WORKSAlbert Einstein was the first to recognize the nature of matter and energy. With his famous E = mc2 equation, he stated that matter and energy are the same thing. Matter is very slowly moving energy– think of glass slowly melting over centuries in very old houses—and energy is very quickly moving matter. This is very important to understand in psychotherapy, because it means that everything– emotions, ideas and thoughts, physical sensations and behaviors, our bodies themselves– almost everything we think, do, feel, and sense—is a form of energy. Think of the microscopic electrons that make up everything constantly whirling around the nuclei of the atoms they are a part of.

What does this have to do with AIT and therapy in general? All the things therapists work with—their clients’ memories, traumas, emotions, physical sensations, cognitions, behaviors, and more—all of them consist of energy whether we work with them to increase insight, for the purpose of venting, changing ideas or behaviors—everything we work on consists of energy and the methods we use do as well. All psychotherapists use their particular methods to move traumatic energy out of their clients with greater or lesser success. AIT does it in a very simple yet effective way:

First client and therapist discover what needs to be treated—usually a trauma, i.e., something that has strongly affected the client emotionally, cognitively, behaviorally, physically, and/or spiritually so that the client is experiencing symptoms– so that the client is suffering. For example, my client Cliff came home from work one day to discover that his wife had left him taking their twins with her without explanation.

Next the therapist and client decide on a phrase that clearly but briefly describes what caused the symptoms. Cliff chose: “Margo left me and took the twins with her, and I don’t even know why.”

Then, following the therapist’s lead, the client repeats his phrase while putting one of his hands at each of the major energy centers of the body, moving from the crown of his head to the bottom of his trunk. He keeps his other hand on the energy center most affected by the trauma he is treating—in Cliff’s case, his heart center. Moving his hand down the energy centers while repeating this particular phrase lets his body, psyche, and spirit know that he wants to remove the traumatic energy about this particular incident and no other—AND THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENS. Cliff repeated the process twice before all the traumatic energy from that trauma was completely gone. Once it was gone, his emotions—shock, anger, and grief—were gone as well. Had we used any of the more traditional methods, e.g., venting, chair work, developing insight, drawing, simply talking, or the like, the likelihood is that it would have taken a number of sessions, not the twenty minutes it took that day.

So AIT actually works by totally removing the traumatic energy that is stored in memories, emotions, beliefs, physical sensations and, in more serious cases, in psychological disorders, physical illnesses, and spiritual blockages, from a particular incident directly from the client.

AIT offers more complex methods for the treatment of difficult disorders, illnesses, and blockages, for example, Three-Step Transformation, which assures that the repetitive traumas that cause many disorders stop repeating. And AIT has special treatment methods for many complex disorders and illnesses, for example, attachment disorders, personality disorders, anxiety disorders including OCD and GAD, and many illnesses including cancer.

Because we focus consciously and directly on traumatic energy and its movement, all AIT treatment happens quickly compared to traditional psychotherapeutic treatment. As a result, AIT clients suffer as little as possible for the shortest time possible as they are being treated — and afterwards as well.